The Witch's Spell
by AinsleyAisling
Summary: Running away with someone you haven't seen in years can turn out to be . . . awkward.  Oneshot, ElphabaFiyero.


He wondered if Glinda'd even had time to notice how different she was. Her voice was rougher, deeper, harsher around the edges, even when she tried to speak gently. There were new lines around her eyes, small but noticeable, and the hand he clutched in his was marred by a fine network of thin scars. Maturity had sharpened the lines of her face and given an elegant lift to her high forehead. Her hair was longer and wilder than he remembered. And her dress - sweet Oz, that dress.

He had to admit it was effective if she chose to embrace her reputation. For the first time Fiyero was secretly a little glad that the rest of Oz was so afraid of her, because it meant that none of them would look at her the way he did. He had never thought of himself as a jealous person; after all, Glinda was beautiful and everyone knew it, and everyone looked at her. But Elphaba was different - Fiyero had always found it pleasant, over the past years when he was devoting his every energy to finding her, to imagine Elphaba's allure as something secret that only he had been clever enough to discover. Most of Oz would tremble at the sight of her now, black-clad, rough, asymmetrical, dangerous. Fiyero was not afraid of her, and because of that he saw only that the top of her dress was tight and closely fitted to the slender curves she had hidden so well when they were at school - or perhaps they were new, too - and that the heavy weight of the skirt swirled enticingly around her ankles and wrapped itself around her thighs as she strode alongside him.

Come to think of it, "pleasant" might not be exactly the right word for how he felt.

Their mad dash ended when the hallway did, and Elphaba made for the stairs that would lead either down to the dungeons or up to the attics. "No," he said, pulling her toward the corner. "This way, look." Elphaba's look of mild curiosity was insanely normal and so ridiculously unsuited to their plight that he laughed as he pressed a hidden catch and released a door that had previously been concealed in the pattern of the walls. "Secret exit, come on."

Elphaba didn't say anything as they hurried into the dark tunnel, and she only watched with the same look of quiet curiosity as he sealed the wall behind them. He took her hand, knowing she couldn't see his smile in the near-pitch-darkness. "When you stage a breakout, always take a Palace guard with you," he joked nervously.

"Is there any light in here?" They were the first words she had spoken since the throne room, and her voice still sent tremors through him.

"No, ordinarily we would bring a torch," he replied, carefully leading her forward into the dark. "Don't worry, I know the way well enough."

"Wait." She pulled her hand from his and muttered something too softly for him to hear. Then suddenly there was a faint light on her face, radiating from a glowing sphere that hovered over her cupped hands. The light was white, but framed as it was by her face and hands it appeared green.

"All right, it's good to have a Palace guard _and_ a witch," he amended. "Let's go, before the guards get back. They'll guess we went this way."

Elphaba held her hand out before them as they began to run. By necessity he sent her ahead of him with the light, calling hurried instructions as they dashed along twisting corridors and down stairs and intricately cut sections of ramp, spiraling gradually down and out of the Palace between its emerald walls. At long last they reached a section of tunnel where the walls were packed dirt instead of wood and carved marble, and the air grew cooler.

"Look," he whispered, laying a hand momentarily on Elphaba's shoulder. "We're down under the Palace now, on our way out to an exit on the edge of the gardens."

"How much further?" she asked over her shoulder.

"About five minutes, at this pace."

"Why aren't they coming after us yet?"

"I'm sure they are," he replied, not bothering to conceal the truth from her. "The tunnel walls are so heavy that they muffle sound, that's why we haven't heard them."

"Where -" Her question was interrupted by a fit of coughing. Although she didn't stop running, her shoulders bowed and shook with the force of it.

"Sorry," he hissed, "it's dusty in here. I should have warned you."

She waved a hand, the one clutching that beaten old broom, to let him know that she was all right, although she couldn't seem to speak.

"Up ahead there's a place where the soldiers store supplies, for when they're posted down here to guard the end of the tunnel. We'll be able to get something to drink there before we move on."

Elphaba had stopped listening in the middle of his explanation. She whirled around and, oddly, continued to run nearly backwards as she asked, "Guards at the end of the tunnel?"

"Oh, no," he said, realizing what had alarmed her. "Only on festival days when the people are allowed on the Palace grounds. Otherwise it's unguarded."

He caught at her elbow to stop her when they reached the place where the soldiers' barrels were stacked high on shelves carved deep into the walls. "Here, stop a moment."

"Do we have time?"

"Just enough, probably, to make sure you can breathe." He pulled a small barrel from the shelves and opened it, sniffing the contents to make sure it was the expected Gillikin wine rather than lamp oil. "This should help."

She took the barrel from his hands, choking a little as she tasted it. Something else he probably should have warned her about. "They _are_ soldiers," he explained sheepishly. "Did you expect water?"

"Expect soldiers to be practical? No, how silly." A rare smile took the edge off her words as she passed the barrel back to him. He watched her openly as he took a long drink of the wine, seeing more and more how much had changed. The Elphaba he remembered had been so shy, so unsure, demure out of awkwardness rather than propriety or coquetry. He had seen a different side of her on the day when they rescued the Lion cub, a stumbling sort of confidence that emerged only when it was needed. _This_ Elphaba, on the other hand, was like that all the time. Whatever she had been doing, whatever she had been through, had made her brash where she had been hesitant; while maturity had given a strangely sultry edge to her sarcasm. He liked it, especially the sultry bit (which he suspected was entirely unintentional), but he wondered if it might be only on the surface.

"What are you looking at?" she asked, her tone a challenging, more dangerous echo of the Shiz Elphaba.

"You," he replied simply. "We'd better move on now." He set the barrel carelessly on the floor, and Elphaba rolled her eyes at him and picked it up, recapping it and setting it back on the shelf.

"No need to advertise we've been here," she said.

"Oh, so you're the brains of this escape operation, are you?"

This time her smile was definitely sultry, in a teasing sort of way. "You've been hunting me for how long, Captain?"

"I've got you now, haven't I?"

"Because I walked straight into your arms." She glanced quickly upward and - yes, he thought, he'd been right, a great deal of her brash confidence was an act, a cover. She had surprised herself; she was nervous. "Figuratively, I mean."

"More than that, I hope," he said boldly, enjoying the way her eyes widened. "But first we have to get out of here."

She coughed. "Lead on, then."

"Just follow around that corner."

They emerged into the warm night at the end of a stone wall, which concealed the door to the secret tunnel within a carving of the Wizard surrounded by happily capering animals. To his relief, Elphaba didn't seem to notice the artwork.

"Where are we?" she asked, allowing the glowing sphere in her hands to disappear.

"To the left is the way down to the river and into the warehouse district. They'll expect us to have gone that way; it's appropriately seedy."

"So where _are_ we going?"

He gestured into the dark, taking the opportunity to wrap an arm around her waist. She tensed, but didn't move away. "To the right are the Palace gardens and an enormously impractical hedge maze that comes out over a ravine at the back of the grounds. From there it's a straight shot to the uninhabited regions on the edges of Gillikin."

"A hedge maze?"

He smiled, knowing she wasn't looking at him. She was very close, and as she spoke she had - whether intentionally or unconsciously, he wasn't sure - rested a hand on his hip. At this proximity he could tell that her smell was different, too - it was familiar, but wilder, like her hair. Elphaba and the wind, he thought, letting his face linger near her temple. "Don't worry, I know all the secrets," he whispered.

"Even in the dark?"

"Can't you do your thing with the light?"

"That would make us rather easy to find, unless this maze has a ceiling over it," she pointed out. "Theoretically I could cloak us from view, but I don't think I could hold both enchantments at once."

"I don't have much of a sense of what you can do," he admitted.

She tilted her head back to look up at him, the moonlight turning her face to a greenish silver. "We . . . really don't know each other very well, do we?" she asked with a trace of laughter in her dark eyes.

He lifted his hand; the touch of his fingers on her hair erased the humor from her face. "I know what I need to know," he said.

"A torch," she said suddenly. "If you can find a regular torch, I can cloak _that_."

He stepped back from her. "Doing things the mundane way. I like it."

Once he had found and lit an ordinary coach lantern, Elphaba waved her hands over it and then frowned, appearing more or less satisfied.

"How can you tell it's working?" he asked.

"I can't, without getting up above us, and I don't plan to fly here. We should probably run."

"Right."

They were deep into the maze, and he was concentrating on remembering all the right twists and turns, when she asked over his shoulder, "Fiyero - why?"

"Why what? Careful, it's narrower here."

"Why did you come with me?"

They couldn't afford to stop, but he took her arm as they ran. "Because it felt right."

"Do you mean . . ." He didn't think he had ever heard Elphaba stammer before. It was endearing. ". . . politically?"

"That's part of it, I guess." The twists and turns had grown closer together, and he took a firmer grip on Elphaba's upper arm to guide her. "I wanted to be doing something that felt right instead of . . . morally ambiguous."

"My goodness, you _have_ changed."

"A witch put a spell on me." He grinned down at her, reveling in her glare. "And, I guess, mostly I wanted to feel something real."

"I don't understand."

"Then I hope to show you later." They walked in silence after that, which meant that he could hear how uneven her breathing had gone.

When they emerged at the other end of the maze, they were standing at the top of the deep ravine he had described. It had once been part of the river, and was filled with old, mostly dead trees and underbrush. He pulled Elphaba behind the end of the hedge, putting it between them and the Palace. "Well," he said, "this is the part where I hope that thing will carry two."

She held out the broom and looked at it. "I've never tried. You're putting your life in my hands now, Captain."

"I'll take my chances." She held the broom toward him sideways, and he batted it gently downward. "Wait, one thing first."

"What?"

He brushed back the wispy ends of her hair, his hands framing her face beneath her hat. "This." He bent and kissed her, not gently. After a quick gasp she responded, her hands rising to mirror his gesture, stroking the sides of his face as his arms wrapped around her shoulders and pulled her hard against him. When they parted she pressed her fingers to her lips, an expression of shock and disbelief on her face. "I told you," he said softly. "I know what I need to know. Now let's fly."

Flying turned out to be a terrifying experience during which he gripped Elphaba's waist harder than he would care to admit. It was a relief to know they had left the guards behind and successfully escaped the Palace. Still, it was an even bigger relief to see the dark edges of the Great Gillikin Forest rising up beneath them, with its attractively secluded and isolated glades. "Stop here," he called over Elphaba's shoulder. "We can hide for the night; you can't keep this up forever."

She evidently agreed, because the next thing he knew she was setting them down in a harrowing drop straight through the forest canopy. "I think you did that on purpose," he said once his knees had stopped threatening to collapse and he felt capable of speaking.

"I did no such thing." She held up the lamp they had stolen and relighted it with a snap of her fingers.

"Fancy," he said, pressing a hand to his still-racing heart.

"A parlor trick." He took her hand and pulled her close to him, and she stumbled. "Fiyero . . ."

"Ssh." He kissed her, this time more slowly, feeling her melt against his chest. "We should light a fire, even in summer we'll be cold here."

"All right," she said quietly. She let him take the lamp and busied herself with setting down her things in the crook of a tree. He lost sight of her in the darkness as he gathered a small pile of dry wood and lit it from the wick of the lamp, but once the fire was lit she was there to take his extended hand and sit on the ground beside him. She had shed her hat and cloak, and her slightly mussed hair shone in the firelight. Her eyes were drawn to the insignia on his guard's uniform, and he quickly peeled off the jacket and laid it behind them, taking both her hands in his and kissing them. "Elphaba?" he asked.

"Kiss me, please," she said faintly, shifting her body closer to him. "I need . . ."

"To feel?"

"Yes."

He obliged, hands skimming her sides and finally holding her up as he pressed harder against her. At the sound of a shaky cry, deep in her throat, he pulled back and looked carefully into her eyes. "Elphaba?" he asked again.

Her glance flickered down to his discarded uniform and she nodded, the barest smile on her face, her hands covering his on her shoulders. "I surrender," she whispered.

He kissed her so hard that she cried out again in surprise, but her fingers tangling in his hair urged him on. His hands were trying to be everywhere at once and then so were hers, and she gasped out against his neck, "Fiyero, if this is the only time we get . . ."

"It won't be," he promised. And then she leaned back and pulled him down to her, and everything ceased to matter - their danger, the fact that they hadn't seen each other in years, the fact that they were both still mostly clothed - everything except getting as close to her as humanly possible. With help from her trembling fingers he rearranged their clothing as much as necessary, and then with a kiss and an arm sliding under her waist, he joined them together.

Her fingers tightened on his arms, but after a moment they relaxed and she returned his kiss. He thought for a moment he might cry at the feel of her - as it was, he buried his face in her neck and whispered her name, and _meant_ it - this was truly Elphaba, without the need for pretense or false bravery, without hiding herself away, just open and beautiful and _his_.

She lay half-draped over his chest afterwards, letting him remove the pins that held some of her hair back from her face and run his fingers through the loosened strands. "You're all right?" he asked, watching her eyes close as he stroked her hair.

She nodded against his chest. "I'm fine. I'm good."

"I mean . . ." He hesitated, but after all, Elphaba had no one but him and they were out in the middle of the woods. He let his fingers trace down towards the hem of her skirt, which lay rucked up over her thighs. "I hope we know each other well enough for this -"

Elphaba's dry tone was both refreshing and strangely . . . well, _wicked_. "I'd say we know each other well enough for just about anything, now."

"I know, but -" His fingers dipped between her legs, and she gasped, her hardened exterior slipping again.

"Fiyero," she began in an apologetic tone, "I don't know if I can -"

"I didn't mean that - I mean this." He withdrew his hand and held it up in the faint moonlight, where they could both see that the wetness glimmering on his fingers was not entirely colorless. Some of it was tinged with red.

"Oh," she said, pulling him back down to her. "Don't worry about it."

"But -"

"It's only to be expected, and really I feel fine."

He settled them again with her head on his shoulder, his face buried in her hair. "I've missed you," he said fervently.

"Life was too peaceful without me?"

"Entirely." He sat up suddenly, hardly noticing that he had practically dropped her to the ground. "Wait - did I . . . ?"

Elphaba frowned up at him, propping her head on one hand. "What's wrong?"

"I forgot something important." His mind raced back over the events of the night and he shook his head, unable to believe himself.

"What did you forget?"

"I love you."

Her eyebrow arched in surprise and her breath caught, but she recovered. "You forgot that you love me?"

"No, I forgot to tell you." He pulled her up into his arms and kissed her. "I love you."

"That's good," she said, nearly tripping over the words. "Because I love you."

"That's very good, then."

"I just wish . . ." The corner of her mouth twisted, and she turned away from him, leaning her back against his shoulder.

"What?"

She shook her head, still keeping her face hidden from him. Her hands fluttered nervously over her skirts, and finally she said, "I wish I could be beautiful. For you," she added, as if to wish beauty for herself would be too selfish.

_I must be very bad at this_, was the only conscious thought in his mind. "Elphaba . . ."

"Don't tell me that I am," she interrupted, catching the hand that he had rested on her shoulder. She turned to face him again, and in the moonlight her smile was rueful. "You don't have to lie to me."

"It's not lying," he said honestly, taking hold of her chin and drinking in the sight of her. "It's - looking at things another way." Not the _most_ eloquent thing he could have said, but he hoped to have the time to make it up to her.

She smiled as he kissed her again and began, hesitantly, to bring up the very sore subject of Glinda, but then her fingers clenched in the fabric of his shirt and she looked away, distracted. "Listen," she said intently. "Did you hear that?"


End file.
